


Invisible Planets

by MissBluebelles



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Auction, Bad Flirting, Getting Together, Hunters, Hurt Lance (Voltron), IN SPACE!, Injured Lance (Voltron), Invisible planets, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance (Voltron) is gone, M/M, Minor Original Character(s), Missing in Action, Rescue Missions, animal companion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-12
Updated: 2018-01-18
Packaged: 2019-03-03 23:31:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13351791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissBluebelles/pseuds/MissBluebelles
Summary: For one reason or another, Lance always finds himself bickering with Keith. One time too many, he rises up to a challenge he wasn't prepared for. The results leave the Voltron team down with only four paladins, the blue one missing along with his lion. And Keith is ready to do anything to get him back.





	1. A challenge

**Author's Note:**

> So the summary might have made it seem a lot more serious than it is? I'm not sure... 
> 
> Anyhow, this is a three chapter long fic on ca 19k words give or take. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Lance was aware that he was in a dire situation. He was feeling terribly cold, and had just woken up from a state of unconsciousness. He groaned when he opened his eyes and tried to adjust himself into a more comfortable position. Feeling returned slowly to his fingers, then his arms, chest, neck. But something was wrong with his legs. He could feel them, but they felt wrong. Or, one of them did. What had happened? 

At first it was just a tingle in it, like an electric shock coming up his leg. But the sensation grew and became more and more painful every moment. In an attempt to ease the pain he shifted his body, or he tried to at least. He was stuck beneath something, something very heavy making him unable to move properly. Also, his leg hurt even more when he tried to, so he stopped. 

He had been so stupid. But that wasn’t completely right. Keith had been so stupid. That’s right! It was all that stupid mullet-head’s fault this had happened to him. Normally, Lance would never have tried such an endeavor. But Keith had been riling him up, making him make stupid decisions. Usually it was the opposite, with Lance agitating Keith. But this time Keith had, and Lance had taken the bait and was now suffering the consequences. At least he wasn’t completely alone, wherever he was. Blue was with him, even if she hadn’t said anything yet. 

He raised his head as much as he could from a laying position to check his surroundings. There wasn’t much to see. A bit further away from him, Blue was lying on her side, every bit as dirty as Lance figured he himself was. He tried to communicate with the castle and the others by tapping on his comms but was greeted with an unpleasant silence. Apparently he wasn’t the only one who’d gotten damaged in the fall. 

“Are you also out of order, Blue?” he huffed with a defeated laugh. Her usual comforting presence in his mind wasn’t there, and he noticed puffs of smoke stemming from her body in various places. Not enough for Lance to believe there was a fire in the cockpit, but enough for him to realize she was broken. He realized it might have been a good thing that he’d been thrown out of her during the crash. Otherwise, he would have inhaled too much smoke and possibly died. That would have been slightly embarrassing. Of all the things that could have killed him in space so far, he didn’t want simple smoke to be his ultimate downfall. Keith would never have let him live that down.

Of course, Lance would've been dead. Nothing to live down. It wouldn’t have mattered.

He frowned as he realized that his thoughts had strayed to a dark place, and took another look around him instead to keep away from there. He approached his situation differently. If he hadn’t been thrown out of Blue, he wouldn’t be in the predicament he currently found himself in. Stuck under rubble from a collapsed cliff. Maybe he wouldn’t have died from the smoke. Maybe he could’ve fixed his baby in that scenario and would be able to fly back to the castle. Too many maybes. It wasn’t relevant either, seeing as that wasn’t what had happened. At the moment, he was stuck under the cliff, whether he liked it or not. 

Evidently, it was he who had crashed into the cliff causing the small collapse. But he didn’t think he deserved the cliff’s immediate revenge, it had been an accident! And it was Keith’s fault! 

“God damn it Keith!” he swore. Lance tried to sit up one more time to assess his leg-situation a little better, but gave up when the increasing pain of it almost had him black out again. When he lied with his back down to the ground again, he realized he could see stars. That meant it was night. Which in other words meant that he must’ve been laying there for several hours. 

Where the hell were the others!? They should’ve found him by now, right?! 

There was no way Hunk would just let him lie somewhere on a strange planet, possibly bleeding out from a gash in the leg from the battle they’d been in. Neither would Keith, even if it was totally his fault that it was actually happening. 

“Where the hell are you guys?” A tear found its way down Lance’s cheek. He didn’t like being alone, wasn’t used to it. Having a large family with many siblings made moments alone rare and at the garrison school it had been sort of the same. If anyone saw the tears he’d blame it on the pain from his leg, or perhaps the beautiful sky. But he’d never admit that it came from loneliness. Preferably, no one would ever see him cry. However, at this point, he wished someone would and ask about it. Just so the silence would shatter.

As he was basking in self pity and trying to ignore the pain shooting up his leg, he didn’t notice the glowing eyes staring at him from some bushes. Nor did he notice as they came closer. 

It wasn’t until the little animal curled up against him that he saw it and started in surprise, hissing in pain due to the sudden movement. The little creature didn’t seem to mind his jerky action. Instead, it hopped onto Lance’s stomach, walking around in a circle a couple of turns before settling into a furry ball of warmth. When the first moments of panic were over, Lance sighed and made himself as comfortable as he could, thankful for the company the animal offered. Then, against all odds, he fell asleep under the starry sky. 

 

***

 

Allura was standing in front of the command center, absently listening to what Coran was saying behind her. She was more concerned over the readings the scanner had collected and sent in to be analysed for them after the battle. 

The battle had been over for several hours now, but they had still to find their missing blue paladin. 

“So as I said…” Coran went on in the background, “...the only explanation would be an invisible planet.” 

It took a few seconds for Allura to process the words, and when she did, she turned to her advisor and looked incredulously at the him. “Surely you are jesting, Coran. There are no invisible planets in this solar system, or any other for that matter.” 

“But how can one know since they are invisible!?” Coran insisted. He seemed far too excited at the prospect. 

“Even if there were, they’d still show up on the scanner,” Allura noted, not really taking him seriously. She glanced at the monitors over the castle and noticed the remaining paladins had gathered in the kitchen. None of them had changed from their paladin suits. And judging by the frowns and heavy gestures at each other, they were fighting over something. 

She sighed. “Coran, could you take over for me? I need to go see what our paladins are up to.” She left the monitors and scanner to Coran, then headed to the kitchen to talk some sense into the distraught humans. 

 

“What the hell were you thinking!?” The shout almost echoed in the room, and Pidge flinched. Thank god it wasn’t directed at her. She looked on as Keith got the scolding of his life from Shiro. The red guardian seemed to shrink more every second Shiro said something. In embarrassment, Pidge assumed. It had been his fault after all. 

Okay, maybe this whole ordeal was not entirely his fault, Lance was also to blame a little for taking the bait. But Lance wasn’t in the castle to get his scolding. In fact, after the battle, none of them had been able to track him or communicate with him. He had gone missing after being shot down.

Tinkering on one of her devices, Pidge listened to the static produced when they tried to access Lance’s channel and establish a connection. 

“You know very well how Lance feels inferior in our group! You don’t challenge him during battle to perform such stupid tricks in order to prove himself, you idiot!” Shiro continued. Pidge hummed in agreement and saw Hunk nodding as well. 

“Oh come on! You know as well as I do that he’s our best shooter! He’s got no reason to feel inferior,” Keith argued. 

“Say that to HIM instead of telling him he’s such a lousy pilot,” Allura interrupted. “Honestly, you all behave like children. Shiro, stop yelling at Keith, there are better things to do that might actually help us find Lance. Coran is scanning our close proximities to see if we can find any trace of where to Lance might’ve been catapulted. Hunk, take Keith and patrol the area. See if you can find anything that the scanner might not pick up.” She pointed the two paladins in the direction of the hangars before turning to the black paladin. “Shiro, you stay on the comm with them. Pidge, what are you doing?” 

Feeling the attention switch to her, Pidge froze for a second before lifting up the device she had been tinkering on. “It’s just another radio com. I’m trying to make it so they’ll never be out of range from the castle,” she sighed. “It’s just that this sort of thing shouldn’t be happening, it pisses me off when the technology isn’t working as I want it to.” 

“Hey,” Shiro said, “It’s okay, we’ll find him.” 

Pidge looked at him, “It’s not like I’m that worried or anything. It’s Lance after all, he’s probably making lemonade or something.” Hunk laughed at that and even Keith gave a small smile in agreement. The Lance they knew could make the best of any situation. 

“Let’s go Hunk,” Keith said and started towards the hangars. Hunk followed suit and Shiro headed for the command centre so he could be with them and talk to them on the comms. Allura observed Pidge for a moment as the girl worked on the device before leaving to join Coran and Shiro. Pidge took a moment to breath in the silence before swearing. 

“Damn it Lance! Couldn’t you have done this some other time!?” She threw the not-working radio on the floor. “I hope looking awesome in front of Keith made up for it,” she muttered as she went to find something to eat. 

 

***

 

The little creature that found a warm spot on Lance’s stomach didn’t leave his side that night and gave him some warmth in return. He decided to name it ‘Princess’, although he regretted it a little bit after realizing it was a male. But by then he figured it was already too late anyway, he had gotten used to thinking of it as Princess. Princess didn’t seem to mind it either, so it got to stay. 

When morning finally came, Lance felt a bit lightheaded. He had managed to get some sleep in between waking up in pain due to unnecessary movement of his leg every now and then. Despite the fact that there was no doubting his leg was in bad shape underneath the rubble, he tried to keep his spirit up. 

“Knowing them, they’ll find me soon you’ll see!” he told Princess, rubbing the animal behind its soft ears. He glanced at Blue for a second, but there was no indication she was going to get up on her own and save him anytime soon. For the moment, he was mostly on his own.

As the sun rose higher in the sky, his stomach made angry noises, threatening Princess who growled in response to the unseen threat. Lance eyed the furry creature with interest as he got an idea. “Hey Princess! Do you think you could become my dinner? Or perhaps see if there is any proviant not damaged inside Blue?” he asked jokingly. The only response he got was a loud yawn before Princess once more laid down on Lance’s stomach. 

“Not huh? Dunno what I expected in the first place,” Lance sighed. He tried to relax, an effort that seem futile on the hard ground, but eventually he found a nice position and fell into another fretful slumber. 

When he woke up, Princess was nowhere near him. The spot on his stomach was chilled, indicating that it must have been gone for a while. Lance almost felt abandoned for being left alone again, he thought they had bonded or something. Was this how Keith felt when Lance didn’t remember their bonding moment? Whatever, at least Lance hadn’t abandoned Keith afterwards. Although, he figured that if the others didn’t come sooner or later, he would actually be abandoned. 

He looked around further away, trying to spot Princess and see if he’d only moved somewhere out of Lance’s eyesight. Though he still couldn’t find him, his eyes found a new target. Something that hadn’t been there before. Now, within his range, one of the emergency capsules filled with either food or water was laying around. How long had it been there and how the hell had he missed it!? 

Lance reached for it and breathed out when the action didn’t cause his leg as much pain as he had expected. Opening the capsule, he released a relieved sigh. Inside it he found fresh water squalping around. With fresh water he could last longer, though it wouldn’t do much for his hunger. 

He was debating whether to drink it all at once or if he should make rations when ome rustling in the bushes closest to him caught his attention. His heartbeat sped up as he glanced towards them. He was completely unprotected if anything decided he looked good enough to eat. Well, Lance knew he looked good enough to eat. Keith had indicated as much once, he was pretty sure of that, but he didn’t want it to actually happen. 

When something jumped out of the bushes he shrieked, something he would never admit to doing if anyone asked. “Princess!!” he exclaimed, his heart rate slowing down considerably at the familiar sight. It seemed to have something in its mouth which it seemed intent on giving to Lance. 

“God bless you Princess, are those berries?” Lance reached for the colorful twig and took it. He had to use some force to pry it from Princess’ mouth who seemed to think it became a game of tug of war. The berries looked tasty, but Lance didn’t recall seeing anything like them on Earth. 

“Hope they’re not too poisonous,” he said before popping one into his mouth. His eyes widened, “They taste just like bananas! What the hell?” He looked at the blue berries in wonder. “This is much better than the green goo!” he laughed. 

After finishing them in a rush he finally felt a little better about his situation. He looked down at his body covered by stone and tried to assess whether there was anything he’d be able to move from his position. Some of the stones were light enough, but if he removed them he feared larger boulders would take their place. So, he decided against it. 

“Thanks, little guy,” he said to Princess who was trotting around him, sniffing on his clothes. Princess climbed on top of him again and sat down watching him with onyx eyes. Lance scratched him behind the ears and stroked his fur gently. “Did you know Princess, your eyes are almost as big and dark as someone I know. But his mullet hair is nothing like your soft fur!” He smiled softly, “It is all his fault that I am here in the first case. Well, not all. I suppose I shouldn’t have let him push all my buttons either. The others always tell me not to anyways.” 

He sighed and continued to stroke Princess’ fur, it was very soothing and calmed him. “I know that I might not be the best pilot in our team, or mechanic or leader or whatever… but I know I’m a great shooter, better than Keith at least and sometimes it feels like that’s all that matters! But what’s the point of being better, if he won’t even acknowledge it? I shouldn’t have done what I did, but the blame doesn’t lie on me…not entirely. Even if it feels like it. Keith should take more responsibility!” He shook his head, “Geez, look at me. I’m talking to an animal… they’d better hurry up and come and get me, or I will be completely Tarzan-ized, speaking to gorillas and swinging through the trees when they do!” 

As if on cue, Princess barked a little and Lance laughed agreeingly. “Yeah, maybe not with this leg!” He thought back to the battle with the small army, allied to the Galra, that were shipping prisoners from one planet to another. The prisoners were civilians of one of the many planets which the Galran army had occupied and conquered. Him, Shiro and Keith had been acting as decoys and maneuvered in space, fighting against the soldiers and drones, as Hunk and Pidge helped the prisoners out of their imprisonment and into the green lion to get taken to safety. 

It had all been going pretty smoothly until the enemy army brought out a weird weapon. That was when Keith had the brilliant idea of convincing Lance to, by himself, jump towards the weapon and see what would happen. This way he could prove he was as good as the other paladins and gather intel for them on the weapon. Usually Lance wouldn’t have been so bothered by the comment, but he had been feeling high from the battle and all blood had rushed to his head. 

Quite gallantly, he had forced his way through the enemy line towards the weapon, bringing down several ships in his wake. Shiro had been yelling at him nonstop to come back to them, but Lance didn’t feel it necessary. He would just destroy the weapon. And prove he was just as good as any of the others. He wanted to show Keith what he was made of. 

It had gone well for the bigger part, forcing his way to the weapon. Circulating around it didn’t make him any smarter as to what it was, and he stopped short in front of it. It seemed to be loading something, a faint light increasing in magnitude at an alarming rate. Lance remembered wondering if it was some kind of gun or a blaster. His ears had barely had time to pick up the shouting from his teammates for him to ‘get the hell away from there’ when a force slammed into him, sending him off with such a speed and intensity that he had fallen unconscious for a second. 

When he had regained his bearings, he had tried to take back control over Blue. However, she hadn’t responded to anything he tried, probably damaged by the sheer force of the cannon. Lance hadn’t seen the planet he was stranded on when they were approaching it, nor had he anticipated being thrown out of Blue when they suddenly had crashed into a cliff before “landing” on the ground. Shocked by the momentum of it all, Lance hadn’t been able to move out of the way when the cliff came down upon him. He had blacked out. 

He snorted and stopped patting Princess, hand falling to his side. “Stupid Keith,” he murmured before dozing off, letting sleep relieve him of the pain.

 

***

 

“Find anything yet?” Pidge asked when she entered the control room. Shiro looked at her and sighed in defeat before returning his gaze to the scanner. 

“Nothing yet, but we’re bound to find something sometime. He can’t have disappeared into thin air,” he answered dejectedly. 

Pidge snorted, “Not as if there was a lot of air there. Space, remember?” 

Shiro groaned but smiled a little. “You holding up?” he asked seriously when he noticed the dark circles under the green paladin’s eyes. Pidge looked uncomfortable at the question and shrugged. 

“It’s like, I dunno, I feel guilty or something about what happened.” She was met with a frown that clearly disagreed with her. “Not like I made him do it or anything! But more like, I never tell him otherwise when Keith riles him up… it’s like I confirm whatever Keith said by not protesting it…” she trailed off and looked at the floor. Shiro startled her by ruffling her hair with passion. “What are you doing!?” she shrieked. 

“It’s not your fault Pidge. If it’s anyone’s, then it’s mine for not stopping Keith. Or for not stopping Lance when he went off and stopped in front of the cannon,” he said. “I’m the leader, remember?” 

Pidge gaped at him, horrified that Shiro would even think like that. “It’s not your fault Shiro, don’t fool yourself into thinking that!” 

“Back at you,” Shiro grinned. He turned his back to her in order to contact Keith and Hunk. But before he did that, he continued what he had meant to say from the start. “In all fairness Pidge, you might as well blame Zarkon for it. Had he not decided to take us at Kerberos, we would’ve returned to Earth without any of this ever happening. Then Lance wouldn’t be missing.” He stopped there and tapped the comms to reach the red and yellow paladin. 

 

Keith was running around in circles around the place where they last picked up Lance’s signal. There was nothing left to find, and it was pissing him off. But then again, he had been pretty pissed off ever since Lance disappeared. Mostly at himself. Keith knew the blame fell on him for bullying Lance into jumping towards the cannon. He was aware how the blue paladin felt being compared to the other paladins, but Keith couldn’t seem to stop talking about it when Lance got on his nerves like he’d done during the battle. That idiot had been laughing in glee, and bragging every time he brought down another ship that Keith hadn’t been able to. Keith had just snapped and the blasted cannon had just been brought out. He wasn’t even sure he could remember exactly what he had said. 

He couldn’t forget, however, the soft gasp Lance had made, and the following “mierda!” before he was sent off into space with such a force that Shiro and Keith almost had seen Blue being compressed by it. Then it had been up to them to take out the remaining soldiers without Lance. 

They’d had to be careful wiping them out, as to not fall victims to the cannon themselves. It wasn’t a laser beam cannon, but they realized that a laser wouldn’t be necessary if the force was directed towards any normal ship. Those would have crumbled immediately under the pressure from it. The battle had ended without another hitch, and they got the prisoners to safety and apprehended the cannon from the enemy. Coran had been beside himself with awe over it. 

The first sign that something was wrong came when they had tried to contact Lance, but all they met with was static. Pidge had then tried to work it out from her end, but nothing had happened. Contact with Lance was gone, and Blue didn’t show up on the scanners. Lance was gone. 

“Fuck, damn it!” Keith shouted, slamming his hands down on the controllers. Red swayed for a second before regaining balance. 

“Keith! Are you okay?” Hunks voice came through the comms. “You lost control there for a moment.” 

Keith took a deep breath to settle himself. “Yeah, I’m fine” he murmured, even though no one would be fooled by his tone. 

“Let’s go a bit further,” Hunk said with understanding. “He must be somewhere around here!”

“Yeah,” Keith agreed and sighed heavily. “Let’s go.” He made a u-turn with his lion and set off to look in the same spot as before, hoping to find something that he had missed earlier. Please be okay Lance, he prayed fervently while searching.

 

***

 

Movement woke Lance up in the early hours of the planet. It was still dark, but he heard screeching and rustling from the bushes. Princess wasn’t by his side and he tensed. It could be a bigger animal with less friendly intentions this time. 

What came through the bushes was Princess in the end, but he was chased by two large, grey aliens armed with landing nets. 

“Catch it! It ran over here!” one of them shouted as it came through the bushes after Princess. They both stopped dead in their tracks when they laid eyes on Lance under the rubble. 

“Shit,” the other one exclaimed. Princess was standing in front of Lance, growling threateningly at the aliens as if trying to protect him. He waved casually to them. 

“Hey, think you could lend a hand?” 

One of them seemed to recover quickly from the shock Lance apparently caused them. “It’s a human… by the maker, here on our planet!?” he shouted. 

“I think it’s stuck,” the other one added. 

“Yeah, wouldn’t mind some help here,” Lance interrupted. “Please.” He used his most charming smile on them, the one even Pidge had trouble resisting. Both gaped at him but started moving again towards him. One of them casually throwing his net on Princess and picking him up before throwing him in a sack. 

“Let him go you arsehole! He’s my friend,” Lance yelled irritatedly. He trailed off when they began to haul away the boulders that he had feared would fall onto him if he moved too much. Then they went onto the ones actually covering his body. 

They made short work of it, and soon Lance was freed from the constant pressure on his legs. He sat up properly for the first time in a while and looked at the leg that was throbbing like mad. A gash ran from his knee down towards his ankle. It looked as if it had been bleeding profusely at first, because his pants were dyed a rustic red. One of the aliens sat down and looked over his leg, prodding and touching. 

Lance flinched and swatted the determined hand away, “Careful big guy, I’m injured.” 

The other one sat down too and inspected Lance’s leg, “I don’t think it’s too damaged big brother.” 

Oh great, they’re brothers. 

“I agree, you take the Herghan and I’ll take this one.” 

All of a sudden, Lance was hefted up on broad shoulders. And the aliens began to walk away with him and Princess. He shouted in alarm but neither of them seemed to care about his discomfort. 

“Hey! I’m okay, just let me get back to my ship and I’ll be off your planet in no time!” 

They stopped abruptly and looked around. “Where’s your ship?” the, apparently, younger one asked. 

Lance sighed in relief, “It’s that lion over there,” he nodded towards Blue where she still laid unresponsive. The younger one’s eyes looked like they were going to pop out of his head. He turned to his older brother. 

“That’s one of the lions forming Voltron!” he shouted in awe. His brother appeared to be as amazed over this as the younger one, but Lance weren’t sure because he couldn’t see his face. 

“Yup, I’m one of the paladins!” he bragged, hoping to get a better treatment since they seemed like fans. 

“Big brother, do you realize how much money we can get by selling him to the galra!?” the younger one was shouting. “This is amazing, this is probably the best hunting trip ever!” 

What? Lance couldn’t believe his ears. They were going to sell him!? He shook his head furiously. “That is one of the worst ideas I’ve ever heard buddy, if you hand me over to them I’m dead!” he wheezed. 

The shorter alien got a strange look on his face, as if he couldn’t see the problem in what Lance had said. “That’s got nothing to do with us.” 

Great, the first response he had gotten from either of them was not in his favor. “Come one you guys! You don’t just sell people!” he tried again. 

“Yeah you do, it’s our business. And since you got stranded on a planet like this it must be fate that you’re going to be sold by us.” 

Lance felt his spirit drop, this wasn’t just happening. Then he realized what the other had said, “What do you mean by ‘a planet like this’? Is there something wrong with it?” He gazed worriedly around him, eyeing the collapsed cliff as if something was going to jump out at them. 

The aliens both laughed. The one holding him hefted him to the other shoulder and Lance grunted. “This is a planet imperceptible to everything!” the older one said and the younger nodded. Lance felt possibly even more confused than before and apparently it showed on his face. “It means that no scanners can detect it and no signals come through, also it is not visible from space. It is see-through. Our business is to find these extremely rare planets, I doubt you actually understand how rare they are, and capture the creatures on them. We then sell them to highest bidder,” the younger explained. 

He presented the bag they kept Princess in, “This here, is one extraordinary creature. A very unusual species; Herghan. Their eyes are used for jewelry that go for insane prices, and the fur is quite popular too. And if they’re wanted alive, they are great for keeping company!” he said. Lance however, was stuck on what the alien had said first. 

“It’s invisible?” he asked weakly, not really believing them. But, it would explain why the others hadn’t come for him yet. They hadn’t found him because he was on a freaking invisible planet!? “God, this sucks” he groaned. 

“No, this is the best thing that has happened in our business!” the older one said and clapped Lance’s leg fondly as he dangled on his shoulders. “You, my little human, are our ticket to a much happier life.” He looked to his little brother, “Let’s get them back to the ship and then we’ll come back and bring the lion.” 

“Yeah” the other agreed and they set off with Lance and Princess. 

 

***

 

Keith sat down on the couch and swore. “Damn it, we’re getting nowhere!” he muttered and got a soft agreement from Hunk. They both had returned after searching for several hours without finding anything that could lead them to Lance. Allura had ordered a night’s rest for them all but Keith had barely been able to sleep. He doubted any of them had. 

They had gathered for a short briefing after breakfast, and then Keith was going out to search again with Shiro. None of the scanners had picked up anything during the night, so they were going out blind. 

“I don’t like this one bit,” Pidge said glumly and Keith huffed. Was there anyone who did? 

“It is very vexing, yes,” Coran concurred while twisting his moustache. He stood up beside the Princess, both in front of the sitting paladins.

“We have checked the immediate area where Lance disappeared to as well as much farther. The question is how much further we must go. We have no idea of how powerful the cannon blast was and therefore we can’t even begin to estimate how far he came. We’ve tried, but as you might have noticed, it hasn’t been of much help,” Allura said dryly. 

“It doesn’t matter!” Hunk interrupted. “But we must find him soon! We don’t know if Lance has got any water or food where he is. What if he’s injured and can’t move!?” Hunk seemed to grow more worried after stating his thoughts, and nervously began to clear the table. Keith recognized his own worries in Hunk’s statement and felt glad someone other than him had said it. He was unsure whether he would have gotten the same calm but agreeing reaction from the team as Hunk did, or if he would have gotten another “You shouldn’t have made him do it”-scolding again. 

“We all feel the same Hunk. However, at the moment there is nothing we can do except continue to search within the parameters where we have concluded he might be,” Allura reassured. When he heard that. Keith rose from the couch. 

“I’m going out now,” he grumbled and quickly left the dining room. He heard Shiro joining him moments later rather than saw him do it. “I’m sorry,” he apologized. He didn’t remember how many times he had in the past couple of days. Only that it had been many. 

A heavy sigh came from his left side as Shiro came up beside him, “It’s not your fault Keith, you didn’t know it would have ended up like this. If you had, you wouldn’t have done anything.” The guilt eased somewhat to hear it, but Keith knew it wouldn’t be completely gone until he’d apologized to Lance too. And maybe hugged him tightly to know he really was okay. They entered the hangars and soon they were off into space looking for their lost paladin. 

 

It had been a week since Lance disappeared, and Keith was growing so worried it affected the others as well. Shiro had tried to get him onto other thoughts through training, permitting Keith to up his game against the droid with another level. It had worked to some extent, but not as much as Shiro had hoped when he allowed it. 

Another thing they had done to occupy the red paladin was by going beyond their initial search area by miles. Alas, without finding anything that might tell them where Lance was. Pidge had been working non-stop at trying to find a solution as to why there wasn’t any sort of signal. “There should at least be something! Unless he was completely torn into pieces, I mean… But even then we should have been able to get something!” she had yelled and thrown some equipment around. The past week had made most of them into wrecks. 

They weren’t going to give up, that much was clear for everyone. The team wouldn’t be the same without their annoying blue paladin who easily would cheer them up when they were down. Shiro knew he wasn’t able to do it himself, and he had seen Lance do it with such ease. Even Keith had a hard time staying depressed if the blue paladin decided to cheer him up, going to extreme lengths to do so. 

Shiro was lost in thought when Coran’s voice came through the comms, requesting everyone's presence in the communications control room. He hurried there, meeting Hunk and Pidge on the way. Inside, Keith was already waiting impatiently along Allura and Coran. 

Allura swept her hair away from her face and beckoned them to stand beside her. “We got contacted a few minutes ago by old acquaintances, I’m bringing them up,” she said and swiped the screen. Two familiar faces appeared on it. 

“Nyma and Rolo…?” Pidge muttered in confusion. Shiro felt a frown appear on his face. 

“Don’t have to sound so happy about it sweetcheeks,” Nyma countered. The two of them were standing in what appeared to be their spaceship. 

“It’s not like we have to talk to you, it’s completely voluntary. Just figured you’d want to hear about this,” Rolo chimed in. 

“About what!?” Keith was quick to ask, and Shiro noted the paladin looked both scared and hopeful. Because at the moment, the only thing they were interested in, was finding Lance.

“I would also like to know what you think we would be interested in hearing about,” Allura agreed. 

Nyma snickered on the comms, “I dunno, maybe we found something you lost? Maybe even someone?” Shiro was pretty sure everyone’s heart rate picked up. 

“Did you find Lance?” Hunk asked faintly, he looked pale. Maybe even paler than the shade Keith had turned.

Rolo scrunched his nose. “Not exactly, we don’t know where he is...” 

“Then why the hell did you contact us!?” Keith interrupted in rage. 

“Calm down Keith!” Shiro had to pull Keith away from the screen so he wouldn’t hit it and damage it. He looked back at Rolo. “I would also like to know why you contacted us if you don’t know where Lance is,” he said curtly. 

“Well as I said before pretty boy interrupted me,” Rolo began. “We don’t know where he is, but we do know where he’s gonna be in two days.” 

“Do you think you could tell us without further ado?” Allura stepped up as if trying to cower the screens. 

“Hey! We don’t need to do this, we just figured it was better not to let him get into Galra hands again!” Nyma said irritatedly. The air left Shiro’s lungs. 

“The Galra’s got him?” he asked weakly. Doom and gloom conquered the room. Even a day in the hands of the Galra could mean life or death for a paladin. There was no telling of what the Galra would do to Lance. And the blue paladin had been missing for more than a day already.

“Not yet!” Nyma hurried to say, and Shiro snapped his eyes to her. “But in two days they probably will, unless you stop it from happening.” 

“May I ask what happens in two days time?” Coran asked. 

Rolo looked serious, “In two days there will be a black auction on the planet of Congrea. It’s pretty famous throughout the universe. There will be items sold for more money than you can imagine, and they also auction out slaves or animals and such. It’s pretty much the biggest illegal auction that exists. All who fiddle on our side of the law know about it, but few can actually enter. Me and Nyma keep ourselves updated on what items and such are gonna be sold there, but we usually keep away. Then we heard a rumor that said the blue paladin of Voltron with his lion was one such item.” 

A gasp came from Keith’s direction but Shiro didn’t bother to check, he was intently watching Rolo and Nyma now. 

“Apparently two Fraylings found them on one of their fucking planets and are now selling them, we hear they’ve already contacted the Galran Empire but wish to see how much they go for at the auction,” Nyma explained as she took Rolo’s hand into hers. Keith was bristling at his side at hearing what was happening to Lance. 

“I’m sending you the coordinates. It’s up to you if you wanna do anything about it, but I’d suggest you hurry if you want to get there in time,” Rolo said. 

“What’s your motive for helping us?” Pidge asked suspiciously, not completely trusting the two to do something like this without one. 

“Let’s just say we’re not too happy with the Galra anymore, and wish to make everything sour for them where we can. That, and, if we’re not getting the money for him, nobody is,” Nyma answered, a wicked smile playing on her lips. 

Pidge snorted, “Alright, I’ll buy that.” 

With that, communication ended and the room fell into silence. Allura closed the holoscreen where Rolo and Nyma’s faces had been visible. But nobody said anything until Keith moved. 

Allura intercepted him as he headed for the doors, “Where are you going Keith?” 

“I am going to get Lance,” he gritted out through closed teeth. 

“I realize you want to go get him as soon as possible, but we have to come up with an idea first. We still haven’t received any signals from him so they’re probably keeping him at the planet still,” she protested. 

“If they’re still there, we won’t be able to find him!” Coran agreed. 

“What do you mean by that!?” Hunk inquired. “We know who got him, we just have to find their planet. I’m sure there’s something in the castle system on Fraylings-or-what-were-they-called?” 

“I’m afraid not Hunk,” Allura told him. “Fraylings do not have a certain planet where they come from, they’re a species constantly on the move hunting for rare items. Or specifically, invisible planets.” 

“Huh?” Shiro wasn’t the only one feeling lost when he processed what she’d said. 

“Invisible? How?” Pidge gaped. 

“Ah, well there are very few records of them. Fraylings are the only ones who have ever been able to find them and they haven’t exactly been keen on sharing the information with the rest of the galaxy,” Coran explained. “But the gist of is that they’re invisible to both eye and any sort of detectors, which explains why we haven’t been able to find Lance. There’s probably something on the planet jamming all signals,” he continued while twisting the moustache. He turned to Allura. “It seems my guess was closer to the truth than one might have thought.” 

She sighed in response and looked at them all. “We won’t be able to track him as long as he’s on that planet, but as soon as they’ve left we should be able to get a signal. That is, if they bring the lion or let Lance wear his suit to the auction. Otherwise we’ll still have problems. Bright side is, now we now where to look for him and when to. We’ve got to get ready, we have an auction to attend!” She smirked and looked over the coordinates they’d been sent. 

The paladin’s left the command centre together in a group. There wasn’t much else to do but let the princess come up with a plan. Until then, they would wait and prepare themselves. There was only two days left until the auction, and then they would get Lance back.


	2. A realisation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah! The second chapter is out! :D
> 
> The last one will be up in a matter of days as well :) 
> 
> School started again today, but hopefully I'll still have time to write as much as I want -.-'

Lance was completely and utterly bored where he sat on the floor of his captors’ ship. At some point he had been terribly worried as well, with all the “We’re going to sell you to the Galra”-talk from the Fraylings as they had called themselves. But eventually, he had gotten bored of being worried and began to fill his hours with complaining about his boredom to the pair. He had to admit it was quite fun to complain, because they seemed very irritated by it but not cruel enough to gag him, so he continued. 

Princess had been put in a cage beside him, and seemed to be on edge for every movement around them. Lance hadn’t been put into one, but he had a chain around his good leg. “Good thing I got you with me buddy,” he said softly to Princess who purred like a cat when he heard the calm voice. 

The Fraylings hadn’t told him that much about the auction where he was supposed to be sold off like some sort of object. But they hadn’t been beneath bragging about their other interesting catches they had sold. Apparently, Lance was the first human they had captured as well as their first person ever. Otherwise they mostly focused on rare animals like Princess; those who could be sold either dead or alive. They had stayed on the planet where Lance crashed the past week, “So we don’t attract unnecessary attention,” the younger had said. The auction was now only a day away, so admittedly, Lance’s nerves were a bit sensitive. 

Much had been going on in the Fraylings nest, they were compiling items and sorting them into boxes. Many of the caught animals were still alive in cages but some of them were to be “fixed” before being sold. Everything was then loaded into their ship. Blue had been the first to be put into the ship since she took up a lot of space. They needed to bring her no matter what, whereas other items were dispensable. He rolled over on the floor and muttered “Stupid Keith,” when his leg hurt. He had gotten it cleaned and bandaged but no pain relief had been offered. 

When thinking of Keith and the other paladins including Allura and Coran, he felt very lonely. He missed them, even if it had only been a week since he last saw them. He wondered whether they would hear about him being sold to the Galra before or after his imminent death. 

“Argh, this sucks!” he shouted to nobody, though hoping the one of his captors would hear him. As if coming to answer his prayer, the older one came through the door. 

“Would you just cut it out!? You’re such a bother!” 

“I’m doing my best!” Lance groaned from the floor. The younger joined his older brother. 

“Don’t worry about it big brother, from tomorrow he’ll just be a bother to the Galra empire, not us.” 

If it was possible, Lance felt even more depressed at hearing that. “Princess! Why does everyone have to be so mean to me!? I am a perfectly lovable guy who deserves more than this!” he complained loudly. Rolling their eyes, the brothers went back to storing their merchandise into the ship. Lance looked to Princess who sat in his cage returning his gaze. “I really miss them… I wonder if they miss me too,” he murmured. “Do you also have someone you want to get back to Princess? Maybe you have a prince waiting for you to come back…” 

He leaned on the wall and sighed, “Our chances don’t look so bright at the moment, do they?” He laughed sardonically., “Since this is Keith’s fault, he should hurry up and come and rescue me… that idiot.” Angry tears were gathering in his eyes and he blinked them away. 

“Why do I always feel the need to prove myself in front of him!?” he asked himself, though he already knew the answer. He wanted to be equals with Keith, stand on the same ground as him. He also knew there was more to it than that, but he didn’t dare to delve deeper into it. Things would become messy if he did. So he stayed content with the way things had been, but sometimes it hadn’t been enough and he ended up doing things without thinking them through completely. 

Like jumping in front of a cannon. He totally didn’t think that one through before doing it. But the sight of several enemy ships going down in a blaze must have impressed the other paladins, and if so, it was probably worth it. Settling down again while humming to himself and Princess, he awaited the dreadful moment of liftoff towards the auction where surely his fate would be sealed for good. 

 

***

 

Knowing there was only one day left before the auction was giving Keith the jitters. There was much at stake and the odds were against them. They had to rescue Lance, and to do that they will have to go against all those who were to attend the auction and their armies. Then they will most likely have to confront the galra again who would be on the lookout for them, assuming they would come for the blue paladin. But no matter, they needed Lance back. Keith needed Lance back, for his own peace of mind. He wasn’t used to the silence in the castle that had been only too noticeable once Lance was gone, none of them was. 

For the time being there was nothing to do except, perhaps, prepare themselves mentally. Keith had been going at it in the training room since morning and had worked up some sweat during the hours. He was interrupted by Shiro at one point who told him not to overdo it, that he should save himself for tomorrow. Keith had had said yes and then, of course, continued to train, setting the droid to yet another level higher. Pidge had also come looking for him after a while, but then immediately left again without saying a word to him. She had simply entered, shot him an incredulous look and turned her back on him again. 

Wondering what her deal was Keith staggered against another heavy blow from the droid when someone suddenly cancelled the program. Turning around, he saw Shiro standing in the doorway with Pidge behind him. 

“What are you doing?” Keith growled, motioning towards the empty space where the droid had been. 

Shiro looked sternly at him, “That should be my question, don’t you think? I told you not to overdo it.” Pidge looked embarrassed behind his back, she must have been the one who’d told Shiro. 

“I’m fine,” Keith muttered and deactivated his bayard. “This is nothing for me.” 

“Keith, this is not just “nothing” as you call it. You’re practically falling over from exhaustion, training more would be foolish so get out of here. Take a walk through the castle or something, just don’t come back here today,” Shiro ordered. 

Keith couldn’t believe his ears, “You’re joking, I’m not leaving yet. I can still take one more level,” he argued. 

Shiro had a grim expression but stepped onto the mat, “Okay then, if you can last more than a minute against me, I’ll believe you.” Not letting Keith argue against him again, he took his stance and immediately shot out towards him. Keith swirled, barely avoiding the swift punch before kicking out. The kick never landed because Shiro dropped to the floor and kicked out himself, bringing Keith down on his back. A second later he was straddled and Shiro was holding his hand against Keith’s throat, “You’re dead,” he said. 

Tears of frustration pooled in Keith’s eyes of not being stronger or quicker. “Damn it,” he whispered. Shiro stood up and offered his hand which Keith took. The tension had left his body and now he was trembling with exhaustion. 

“Go take a shower Keith, then rest. We need everyone at their best tomorrow, Lance needs us at our best.” 

Weak as a lamb, Keith complied to Shiro’s suggestion without further protest. 

Later on, they all gathered to eat in silence. The mood was tense for they all knew what could go wrong. 

“I have set our coordinates towards Congrea and we should be there sometime before the auction,” Coran said, breaking the silence. “We have to expect fire from the immediate getgo and be prepared to return it. Pidge and Shiro will be the ones to go for Lance. Keith and Hunk, you will be defending them close up. Then we will cover you from the castle,” he explained. 

“Why can’t I go for Lance!?” Keith protested. 

Shiro sighed in resignation and put a hand on his shoulder, “Keith, just… let it go, you know you’re better off fighting in open space. Me and Pidge might have to enter the auction if we can’t get him before. Pidge will have to track him and I will act as her backup. We will need you out there to cover us when get have taken Lance back.” 

Keith mumbled something incoherent, and Shiro took it as he understood. He watched them all one by one, “There is just one thing I want you all to remember, and that is the while Lance still is top priority, we can’t let the Galra take another of us. If you feel you are in danger of being captured, abort the mission and return to safety.” 

He saw Keith breath in heavily, “No way!” the young man gasped. 

“Keith,” Shiro said warningly and looked at him. “There is no way Lance would want us to put ourselves in danger to rescue him.” 

“I won’t leave him!” Keith shouted in response. Shiro noticed that Hunk had a similar rebellious expression on his face. 

“Shiro is right Keith,” Allura agreed softly. “Though we would like to save Lance, and that we will try to do, we just can’t let the Galra get away with more than one lion if it comes down to it.” She looked at them all when she spoke again, “You paladins are the Defenders of the Universe. The planets need you free, not in the clutches of the enemy we’re fighting against.” 

At this Hunk rose halfway out of his seat, “But if we don’t do everything we can, Lance will be in their clutches!” he barked. Pidge motioned him to sit down again and he did. 

Allura sighed, “Yes Hunk, he would be. But we are going to do our best so that won’t happen, are we not? Just that before you decide to do something reckless, remember that the universe needs you, not just Lance.” 

Shiro swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded, feeling the weight of their responsibilities. Beside him Keith was looking down on his food with a pale face. 

“You don’t understand…” he whispered. Shiro frowned at him, not understanding what the red paladin was trying to say. 

“Keith? What do you mean?” he asked, wanting the boy to clarify.

Several tears fell in a rapid succession down Keith’s face and they all gaped in surprise. 

“Keith, are you okay!? Is something wrong!?” Pidge was quick to inquire. 

“You don’t understand!” Keith hiccuped, tears now flowing freely. “I won’t let them take Lance!” he sobbed. 

“That’s okay Keith, that’s what we’re planning to prevent” Shiro said, treading carefully. None of them had ever seen Keith so emotional, not even Shiro who had known him many more years than the others. 

“No, you… *hiccup* I mean… *hiccup* No matter what! I won’t let them have him! He’s… Lance is…” Keith stopped short, tears still running along his cheeks. He looked surprised. 

Allura leaned in towards him, “Lance is what… exactly?” she asked. 

Keith’s eyes widened in shock and he abruptly stood up from his chair, “Nothing!” he yelled and stormed out of the room, leaving a confused group in his wake. 

Coran twirled his moustache, “You humans can be so peculiar at time.” 

Allura nodded, “Very peculiar indeed.” She looked to the rest of the paladins, “What was that about if I may ask?” 

“Eh, well…” Shiro was struggling for words to explain what just had happened but couldn’t come up with anything. He looked to Pidge and Hunk for help. Hunk also seemed to be at loss but Pidge threw her hands into the air. 

“It’s very simple actually, you just need to use your eyes to see it,” she claimed. When nobody said anything she turned her eyes to them, “Aww, come on! Keith likes Lance and doesn’t want him to be taken.” Shiro felt slightly confused, but somewhere in his mind a fog was beginning to clear. 

“But I also like Lance?” Hunk said in confusion, Shiro agreed, they all liked Lance. He was a very good friend. 

Pidge rolled her eyes, “No, I mean… really likes,” she made smooching sounds with her mouth and Shiro felt his cheeks redden when he realized what she meant. Did Keith swing that way? “It’s the typical situation: you bully the one you love to get their attention...kids behaviour,” Pidge explained. “They’re always at each other’s throats, must be the sexual tension,” she continued without missing a beat. Shiro coughed, trying to interrupt. Allura was fanning her face with her hand, and Coran looked as if something he’d been pondering on suddenly made sense. Hunk was sitting still with an odd expression, looking like he still hadn’t quite understood what Pidge meant. 

“Uhm, Pidge…” Shiro gestured for her to stop. “Is this all in your mind or…?” he let the question remain unspoken. Pidge mused over it for a while before answering. 

“Well, my belief is that neither Lance nor Keith has realized it themselves which is why they’re at each other like cats and dogs. But now, considering Keith’s reaction to the possible event of having to leave Lance behind, I’d say he has understood his own feelings which is why he went off like that.” Shiro exhaled loudly, he had to admit it sounded very realistic. It would explain Keith’s mood and behaviour of the past week. 

“And you say Lance feels the same?” he asked. 

Pidge pondered on it but shrugged, “I don’t really know in Lance’s case. He’s kinda hard to read.” Someone cleared a throat on their side. 

“Umm, I don’t think it’s impossible,” Hunk interjected vaguely. “Lance has always been bi-sexual so…” He seemed to be lost in thoughts. 

“Well then, case closed,” Pidge said and polished her glasses before putting them on. “They’re in love!”. Shiro didn’t think it was that simple, but let her have her moment of glory. He was more worried what the consequences of it could be. He stood up. 

“I am going to check up on Keith,” he announced. 

“Yes, an excellent idea!” Allura chimed in. She seemed to marvel at the thought of love between the two paladins, her eyes were shining. “Please tell him we’re all very supportive!!” she requested with a smile. Once more that day, Shiro sighed. 

“I will” he agreed. He then left to find the upset red paladin. They couldn’t let his emotions be in turmoil this close to the rescue mission. Lance would need them at their best.

 

***

 

There were moments in Lance’s life that he appreciated a lot. Some more, some less. Sitting in a spaceship on the course to a black auction where he was going to be sold to his enemies was one of the moments he did not appreciate, at all. One might even say he detested his predicament. 

He had voiced his opinion loudly to his captors who finally had snapped and decided to gag him, “This way you won’t bother anyone during the auction at least!” had been their excuse. A poor one, in Lance’s opinion. In his head he was creating the most evil rhymes about the Fraylings that he could come up with, hoping to be able to convey them before being sold. They’d told him there was quite a commotion about him being one of the items being sold at the auction. Many oldtimers who hadn’t been coming for several years had accepted their invitations to the auction just to see a paladin with their own eyes. 

Lance huffed in annoyance as good as he could with the primitive gag. For the trip he’d been put in a cage just like Princess and several other creatures, but he had been put on the flight deck instead of the storage area. He kind of wished he’d been put in the storage with Princess, at least then he’d have some pleasant company instead. 

They had been on their way for some time, but he didn’t know exactly how long it would be until they arrived on Congrea. He was dreading the moment. He wished they’d never arrive there. That they would run out of fuel and thus miss the auction. 

It was as if he had jinxed it by thinking about it, because the older brother turned around to face him. “Sit still now, we’re landing in twenty minutes,” he called before turning his back on Lance again. For half a second, Lance considered doing the complete opposite and stand up to spite the alien. However, he discarded the thought and instead took in the planet they were approaching. It was completely covered in blue. Only oceans wherever he looked. Where were they going to land!? 

As if hearing his unspoken question, the younger pointed towards a grey spot in the middle of the blue. “That’s where the auction is going to take place, it’s a plateau that rises from the sea. Pretty cool eh?” Lance only nodded, he was mesmerized by the sight of so much water. It was the first time since Earth he saw so much gathered in one place, and it was actually covering the whole planet? He was impressed. 

The closer they came, the bigger the plateau became. He spotted ships in varying designs and sizes on it. At first, Lance had been surprised that none of the ships were camouflaged even though they were out in the open. But he supposed there was no need to, all of them belonged to criminals as far as he was concerned. They wouldn’t worry about their ships being stolen, nobody would dare to do it. 

When they had docked, he was left alone for a while on the ship. That was when reality came crashing down around him and he turned into a wreck. ‘He wanted to go home’ was the thought that occupied his mind. Home to his family on Earth. He wanted to see his siblings, his parents, abuelos and primos. He didn’t want to be turned over to the Galra empire. He was sobbing quietly when the Fraylings came back. They looked a bit perplexed and avoided him until he’d stopped. Assholes, Lance thought, can’t even comfort a person who’s feeling down right in front of them. 

While he was down, they had begun to empty the ship and bring everything into a dome placed in the middle of the plateau. Lance’s cage was the last to be brought in.   
Inside the dome, he was put among other crates that were being unpacked for the auction. In passing, someone told him he would go out on stage in his cage, “So just be still and behave.” Blue was with him at this time. They were going to be displayed together as a set; the paladin and the lion. She still hadn’t responded to anything Lance did, and he was becoming increasingly worried about her state which seemed to be worse than ever before. The time flew by as workers rushed about. Lance couldn’t decide whether it went by too slow or too quick, but before he knew better there were people gathering backstage in fine clothing. 

It appeared the auction was about to begin. 

 

***

 

The talk with Keith hadn’t been the most productive one. The red paladin seemed to have been in shock over realizing what he truly felt before the blue one. Because Pidge had been right, Shiro had concluded. Keith was in love with Lance. Or, at least he held a fair amount of affection for the loudmouthed paladin. Now they were sitting in their lions, prepared to get him back. 

A strange calm had fallen over the castle, showing that everyone took this rescue mission seriously. The stakes were way higher than what Shiro would ever feel comfortable with. Allura’s voice came through the comms. 

“The auction seems to be underway,” she reported. “No Galra ships detected on the scanners so far. Maybe they won’t arrive until after?” She let the question hang for a few seconds. Keith was the first to respond. 

“Then we won’t get to meet them, we’re setting out now.” Everyone concurred with Keith’s statement and lifted off, flying in their lions towards the blue planet. Towards their friend in need. They met no resistance at all on their way which was slightly confusing. But Shiro reminded himself and the others that the planet was expecting guests of all sorts, and probably assumed them to be as well. Despite the fact that they rode in lions. 

Keith and Hunk stayed in space, watching and guarding the planet in case the Galra appeared before Pidge and Shiro managed to get to Lance. Meanwhile, Shiro and Pidge went down, easily spotting the plateau Nyma and Rolo had mentioned in a message attached to the coordinates. They landed without any problems and checked for any sign of enemies approaching before leaving their lions concealed behind them, entering through a door to the dome. 

“It wasn’t locked… they gotta fix their security or they are going to be robbed blind,” Pidge complained, connecting her tablet with a control panel on the wall. 

Shiro smirked a little, “I don’t think anyone would dare to steal from this place. From what I’ve gathered, only bigshots are invited to this place as buyers, or those who have been longtime sellers. Nobody would want to get on their bad side.” 

“Except us!” Pidge returned his grin. 

“Which you might want to keep to yourself until we’re gone,” Shiro scolded her, looking around to check nobody had approached them without them knowing and was listening in. 

“Whatever,” Pidge retorted but did as he suggested, she didn’t want anything to go wrong when they were so close to achieving their goal. While Pidge was fiddling with her devices, Shiro went down the corridor to get a better outlook of the area. He spotted some aliens hurrying through the halls, either latecomers or workers. Cautiously, he followed them to where he assumed the actual auction was taking place. He stuck close to the walls, always ready to activate his arm if necessary. 

When he came up to a double-door, he looked back to see if Pidge was done with her part and had caught up with him yet. She hadn’t. Shiro pushed the door open slightly and stuck his head inside, he had found the mainstage!   
The dome was huge and it was jam-packed with aliens of different species, all conversing with each other and bidding on the items being displayed on the stage by a few workers clad in fine suits. His eyes wandered over the audience and the stage when Pidge suddenly came up behind him whispering, “I’ve hacked into their system. They only had some minor safety precautions in it so it was a piece of cake.” 

Shiro patted her head, something she didn’t appreciate judging by the look she shot him. “Well done Pidge. Find anything interesting?” he asked. 

Pidge shook her head, “Nah, I found and disabled all of their alarms and also some lockdown protocols. Nothing on Lance in their system, nor on anything being sold today. Probably don’t want to leave any tracks.” She peeked inside the dome beside Shiro and her eyes widened a little. “Geez, that’s a lot of people,” she muttered. 

“I’ll attest to that,” Shiro agreed. He checked behind them again and closed the door. “Let’s go around and see if we can find where they keep the stuff before bringing them out on stage,” he said and began to head down a curved corridor. 

“Here, I have a map!” Pidge told him and brought one up with her pad. They looked it over together before continuing down along the corridor, taking a left and then a right before arriving at a door leading to the backstage area. Shiro motioned for Pidge to stay behind him and she quickly complied, drawing her own weapon. They entered the area with caution, and hid by some unopened craters by the wall. When a worker walked past them carrying a box they ducked and decided to have one of them go, and for the other to cover their tracks. 

“You first,” Shiro whispered to Pidge, and proceeded to survey the area as she left to find another place to hide. He followed her quickly, and they examined the new area. There were a few workers here and there, moving crates, opening them and making sure they weren’t damaged. Pidge gasped when her eyes rested on a big sentient robot.

“Look Shiro, it’s Blue!” She pointed to the other side of the room and Shiro followed her direction. Indeed, there she was, occupying space along the wall. Her size made many other crates seem small in comparison, though Shiro didn’t doubt they were bigger than him by far. 

“Let’s get over there!” he decided and began to move before she managed to respond. It took them a few minutes to cross the room unnoticed. At one point they’d almost needed to backtrack to where they started so they wouldn’t be seen. 

When they finally could hide beside Blue, Pidge exhaled noisily. Surprised, Shiro turned to her to hush her but stopped when he saw her face. She looked him in the eyes and said one word, “Lance.” Then she pointed to a place closer to where the workers were flustering about. There in a cage, a bit dirty and gagged but otherwise looking fine, was their blue paladin. 

Shiro got the castle on the coms, “We’ve found Lance!” he reported. 

“That’s marvelous news” Allura chirped in response. “Do you foresee any immediate problems to when you get him out of there?” Shiro and Pidge looked at the workers coming and going in the room. 

“Not if we’re unafraid of using force. I suspect there will be resistance from those working here when we come for one of their goods,” Shiro speculated and got a hit from Pidge. When he rubbed the place she’d hit, and looked questionably at her, she hissed at him, “Lance is not one of their ‘goods’!” He sent her a quiet apology, regretting his choice of wording. On the com, Keith’s voice boomed. 

“Do you have Lance!? Is he okay!?” Shiro exchanged a glance with Pidge who seemed overly satisfied with herself. 

“No Keith, we don’t have him yet but we can see him from where we are,” he answered the worried paladin. Once more he took in the state of the blue paladin, “He seems fine, he’s gagged but- No wait!” he interrupted himself. 

“Is something wrong with him!?” Hunk’s worried voice joined the conversation. Pidge picked up where Shiro trailed off, apparently having noticed the same thing as he had. 

“One of his legs is covered in bandage, he’s sitting down so maybe he can’t put weight onto it,” she told the rest of the team. 

“That might pose a problem…” Allura said. “But nothing you won’t be able to handle. Shiro, you would be able to carry Lance if it came down to it, am I correct?” 

“Yeah, sure I would.” he answered. “Only problem would be if we came under attack. I don’t think I could carry him while under fire.” 

“Don’t really see the problem. Just give Lance the gun and leave it to him,” Pidge intervened and was met with snickering on the coms. 

“If he can shoot properly from my shoulder that is,” Shiro smiled, knowing that Lance would probably be able to do it. 

“Alright then, quit your chattering and get to business!” Allura ordered sternly. “If we can get him out before the auction ends and before the Galra appears that would be the best!” They all replied in unison and Shiro closed the link to the castle. 

“Any suggestion on how to catch his attention?” he asked Pidge who nodded. They wanted Lance to know they were here for him, that they hadn’t abandoned him. 

“I was thinking of waking Blue up? We have to get her out as well after all,” she said and patted the lion. 

“I was thinking of a more subtle way Pidge,” Shiro protested and she shrugged. 

“Then I’ve got nothing at the moment.” Shiro sighed and looked over to Lance who sat still while watching the workers do their thing. He mulled over it for a second but realized he was wasting time they might not have. 

“Okay, do it.” 

He moved over to give Pidge better access to the lion and she began to evaluate what could be wrong with it.


	3. A confession

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoop whoop! The end~ ;D
> 
> Hope you've enjoyed the story! This was actually my first idea for the Voltron fandom, but not the first to be published :)

The workers had told Lance he would be displayed last of all the items and livestock. 

But, unlike other slaves, he got to stay in the room where everything was being packed up and not in the backrooms. He assumed that was because he was regarded higher or something, like a prize instead of a possession. Or maybe it was the other way around? He didn’t really care, it wasn’t as if he could talk to anyone anyway. And worrying about it didn’t help. 

He looked to Blue and pitied his own situation. He was about to blame Keith for it again, but realized it wasn’t funny to do anymore. Sighing, he began to study his feet for the umpteenth time since he was put in the cage. He wished he could take the gag off but they kept his arms tied behind his back. Should he take that as a compliment? Maybe they thought, being a paladin and all, he would have some sort of superpower that could get him out of the cage? 

The thought made him laugh inside, if he had powers he wouldn’t have let himself be caught after all. Some movement by Blue caught his eye and he looked at her. When he did, she stopped, and Lance figured he had imagined it. She was far too broken to come to life without being repaired first. 

However, he hadn’t imagined it. That became clear when her eyes came to life and started glowing. 

No one else in the room seemed to notice what was happening, and he stared at her without commotion. Movement flickered by her back, but it wasn’t Blue moving herself. It was a person… a person Lance knew! His eyes filled with tears of relief when he got eye contact with Shiro. Another head soon popped up beside Shiro’s and Lance could have laughed out loud when Pidge grinned at him. They had come for him! 

Both of them disappeared down behind Blue again and Lance looked elsewhere as to not draw attention to her. He realized Pidge must have done something that woke Blue up, and thanked her silently. That was another stone lifting from his chest. 

While trying to look anywhere but Blue, he noticed the workers had begun to bring in animals to the room, some already on their way out on stage in their cages. Had so much time already passed? There had been hundreds of crates with items, surely not all had been sold already. He then realized that there could be some items that already had been bought and merely were displayed to a bigger audience, like he was going to be. 

Or scratch that, he was getting out of there soon. 

Looking back to Blue, Lance wondered whether Shiro and Pidge were getting him out before or after he had been on stage. And where the hell was Keith!? That guy should also be there to rescue him since it was all his fault Lance was there. His thoughts came to an abrupt end when Blue suddenly roared and Shiro appeared on his side, already working his way through the bars of the cage with some kind of laser. 

“Shiro!!” Lance shouted in relief, although it came out muffled and inaudible. 

Shiro shot him a smile, “We’re getting you out of here Lance.” The cage broke down and he made short work of the ropes tying Lance’s arms together. As soon as the gag came out Lance began to thank Shiro profusely but was interrupted when Shiro pulled him down on the floor as they were being shot at. People had begun to notice, no thanks to Blue who was fully activated again.

“We’ve got to get to Blue!” Shiro yelled over the noise. “Then we’ll get out of here!” 

Lance nodded. Pidge was covering for them as they ran towards her and Blue. 

“Hurry up and get inside!” she yelled at them. It was to stretch the truth to say they hurried. Lance was trying to, but his leg gave up beneath him midway, and Shiro had to half carry and half drag him over the floor. 

“You okay?” Shiro had asked breathlessly as they took cover by a crate, trying to catch his breath. 

“Yeah, it’s just that my leg hurts…” Lance had managed to answer before they were on their way again. The commotion from firearms and shouting had brought armed guards to the room who had joined the workers trying to subdue them. Apparently they didn’t like it that one of the prisoners had decided to leave early. So even though they shot at Lance and Shiro, none of the shots were to kill, only to injure. No harming their precious wares. 

“Hey! Get back here!” someone shouted and Lance saw the two Fraylings come running with their weapons drawn. But by then, Lance and Shiro had already reached Blue, and Lance was helped into her so he could get them out of there. 

“Hi, baby,” he whispered to her as he took the controls. Her presence filled him for the first time in days. It made him calm, knowing that she was going to be fine. Both of them were. When Shiro and Pidge joined him, he had Blue stand up. She was surrounded by aliens who all stood apprehensively and watching her tentatively, not knowing what to expect from the big lion. They had all heard the stories about Voltron and the paladins. 

Lance’s eyes were glittering when Blue roared, making everyone take a step back. “That’s right, you should all fear my wrath.” He aimed at the ceiling with Blue’s tail and made a hole with the laser, big enough for Blue to get through. Then they jumped. 

“Lance, we have to get down to the plateau. We left Black and Green there!” Shiro quickly announced before Lance made off for space. 

“Ah, yeah” Lance nodded. “Sure.” He would have preferred to just leave for safe space, but leaving Green and Black was out of the question.

Pidge knocked on his shoulder as he steered Blue downwards. “Aren’t you going to respond?” she asked. For a second Lance was confused. Then his ears tuned in on the comms where several voices came through simultaneously, trying to drown out each other. He made out “Are you alright!? Are you hurt!? Did they hurt you!?” being repeated by all and he smiled, a lump forming in his throat as he answered them that yes, he was alright now. 

He docked beside Green and Black, and Shiro and Pidge jumped off to enter them instead of flying in Blue. 

“Let’s get out of here now!” Pidge yelled when the plateau was being crowded with more guards than there had been in the room. It seemed like they weren’t shooting to injure anymore. Instead they had switched to shooting with the intent to kill. As the lions leapt of the plateau, a picture of a small furry animal entered Lance’s mind and he swore violently. He had forgotten Princess. 

He stopped in midair despite being shot at and turned around. 

“What are you doing Lance!?” Shiro shouted through the coms. “We want to get out of here before the Galra comes!” 

“I forgot about Princess!” Lance shouted back as he started against the plateau again. “I can’t leave him behind! He saved me!” Shooting several beams towards the dome and scattering the shooters from below, Lance approached it carefully. He couldn’t forget that Blue was still damaged from the crash, she hadn’t been repaired properly since. He circulated and tried to figure out where to land. 

Over the comms he heard Shiro swear which surprised him a little, but he didn’t have time to think about it. He knew they wouldn’t accept his reasoning if he explained. A fluffy animal wasn’t worth getting into danger for, or it shouldn’t at least. But Lance owed that to Princess. 

He shot several beams towards the roof of the dome, destroying it and creating openings for himself. He noticed that Shiro and Pidge had turned around and were covering him from the enemy. Knowing that he owed them bigtime for the help, he flew into a hole in the dome that he only a few minutes earlier had escaped from. 

Lance didn’t end up where he had been held though, the room he’d entered seemed to be where sold items were kept until they were claimed by their new owners. There were no armed guards inside anymore, all had joined the fight outside. However, sooner or later they would come for him too. They’d all seen him when he entered the dome, Lance hadn’t been very secretive about it after all. But he appreciated the lack of them when he stalked through the rooms in Blue looking for Princess. 

He recalled that the first live creature had been taken onto stage just moments before Shiro and Pidge had released him. The auction must’ve been halted, but the animals were probably still in the room adjacent to the one Lance had been in. He headed in the direction he figured was the right one, when he came across a room with people. People in cages. “Damn it” he muttered. 

They were the slaves that were going to be sold today. Lance looked at them. It wasn’t even on the market that he would leave without freeing them at least. He would’ve been one of them, were he not a paladin. Seeing the hope lit up their eyes as he stepped out of Blue, he also realized that he wouldn’t leave them after freeing them. Because there was no other method to leave the plateau than using a spaceship, and he doubted any of them had experience in piloting one. 

Breaking the locks, he counted heads and found that they were in total fourteen; twelve adults and two children. 

“Thank you paladin,” one of the adults said and patted his back. 

Lance laughed, “No need to thank me until we are out of here. See if you can squeeze everyone into Blue, it will be tight and most likely uncomfortable but it’s the only way. Unless any of you know how to fly a spaceship?” He peered at them but no one raised a hand. 

While they were getting into Blue Lance looked around. “Anyone who noticed or know where they kept animals?” he asked. 

It seemed like no one knew until one of the children looked out from Blue and said “I know where they put them.” 

Lance looked to the kid. “Really!? Where are they? I need to go there.” 

The child pointed to a door in the opposite direction of where Lance had been coming from, at least he had been on the right way. “Two rooms away in that direction.” 

“Thanks kid!” Lance shouted as he started sprinting towards the door, drawing his weapon. 

“Where are you going paladin!?” someone shouted after him, worry evident in the distress of the tone. 

“Don’t worry! I just have to get something first! You guys get into Blue, she’ll protect you!” he shouted back. Coming through the door, he halted and checked so that nobody was in the room. When he saw it was safe he proceeded to the door on the opposite side of the room. He listened in on the door, trying to hear if there were any voices present on the other side. There were none he could hear, so he opened the door. 

The new room was occupied by more cages than Lance had ever seen in one place before, maybe even more cages than he had seen been brought in. He started running between lanes lined by cages looking for Princess. He could feel the adrenaline fueling him coming to an end. It scared him a little. Because at the moment, he was literally running on it. Had he not been filled of it, he probably wouldn’t have been able to stand on his leg. He looked down at it and noticed that the bandage had been discoloured by red. The wound had reopened at one point during his rescue op. 

“Great,” he murmured to himself and quickened his pace. He was going through some of the last lanes when some guards invaded the room. “Fuck!” He swore and hid behind a large cage as they turned fire on him, not caring about the animals that got injured in the process. “Hijos de puta!” he yelled at them. He couldn’t return fire properly without risking to harm the animals, and that he simply couldn’t do. Continuing his search as best as possible, he hid behind some of the smaller cages stacked on top of each other. When he aimed for a guard, a familiar growl reached his ear and he pulled the piece of cloth off the top cage. He was met with a pair of jetstone eyes. 

“Princess!” he exclaimed, sagging in relief upon finally finding him. Instead of opening the cage, however, Lance opted to carry it. That way he wouldn’t risk Princess getting scared and escaping in the chaos. It was heavy, but he could do it. He had to. He wished he had been wearing his suit and helmet, then he could have talked with the other’s on the comms. They were probably worrying about where he had disappeared to since they couldn’t contact him. 

“Now we just have to get back to Blue,” he murmured quietly to Princess.

 

Tracking back the same way he had come from, albeit slower and under fire, Lance made his way towards the blue lion with Princess under his arm. He had a close call at one point when he had to run out into the open to pass through the door, but hadn’t even been scraped by the laser shot. But a scorch mark had been left on the wall beside his head. Closing the door quickly, he sent a ‘thank you’ to whatever was watching over him before pushing a red button on the control panel beside it that he assumed would lock it. 

At least it didn’t open it again, and Lance hurried across the floor, entering the room where Blue was again. Thankfully, no guards had come through this room, and one of the saved slaves was waving from Blue for Lance to get over there. He shouted across “I could use some help,” and pointed on Princess’ cage. It had become more difficult to carry it. Not that it was heavy, but because it was unwieldy and his leg hurt more now. 

The man who had been waving met him halfway and took Princess’ cage with ease. Now that Lance wasn’t being slowed down anymore, he picked up the pace a notch. Then he heard a loud noise from the room that he moments ago had exited, then came the shouting. Guards had finally managed to come through the door. They didn’t seem to have done it by unlocking it, judging by the noise and debris dam reaching out in the room to where Lance and the others were. Lance was halfway across the floor when searing pain blossomed in his leg. The one that had been fine. 

Until now, Lance had made do with only one good leg, but with both in intense pain there was no ‘keep on walking’. They both gave up beneath him and he fell heavily to the floor with a grunt. 

“Paladin!” someone shouted and Lance noticed with tears in his eyes that the ex slave already had carried Princess to Blue and was now heading back for him. And, oh my, Lance thought, he had found a gun inside of Blue that he now was aiming unsurely at the guards beginning to fill the room. 

“Just hurry over here!” he yelled at the man who fired random shots on the way without actually hitting anyone. “Give that to me,” Lance motioned towards the gun when the man reached him and knelt by him. He did get the gun. Although, he was also immediately hefted onto the shoulder of the man, who then proceeded to run back to Blue. 

Lance did his best to aim from where he jounced up and down, but had a hard time, only managing to take down three of the eight enemies present. However, this time luck seemed to be on their side. Neither the man carrying him or Lance himself got shot and they could enter Blue. It was cramped inside with so many people there. Lance was half dragged half carried to the pilot seat where he took a short breather before activating Blue. The lion roared to life and took a few steps, feeling the unusual weight and readjusting to it. 

Lance took off as fast as possible by making another hole in the roof. Now that he was surrounded by Blue, he didn’t feel as worried again. None of the guards’ shots left even a dent in her steel. Several holograms manifested to his side, showing the faces of the paladins.

“Lance!”

“What the hell dude!?”

“Lance, what were you thinking?!”

A stream of endless questions and shouts reverberated through Blue, and Lance winced. He scooted over to give everyone a better view of the crowded space behind him. Realisation dawned on their faces. 

“How many are there?” Shiro asked. “Do you have enough space for them all?”

“Fourteen of them,” Lance answered with a nod. “It’s a bit tight, but we’ll make do. But I’d prefer not to engage in battle with them here.” He laughed and winced when he moved his legs. “I’m not sure I even can engage in battle,” he muttered. 

“Something wrong Lance?” Hunk’s voice was strained, filled concern for his best friend. 

Lance shook his head. “It’s nothing, my leg just hurts.” One of the released prisoners leaned over him and whined.

“But paladin, your legs-” 

“It just hurts a little!” Lance interrupted the alien immediately. “Anyhow,” he continued before any of his friends would pry further. “We’re getting out of here now, right?” 

A confirmation from Shiro lifted his spirits. 

“Then let’s go! No use in wasting time down here! I want to get back to my bed! Lance out” With that said, Lance closed the hologram and shot off. While he hadn’t been gone for a long time, he missed the castle. And, he really missed his bed. It was a thousand times nicer to lie in than laying on the ground under rubbles, or, sitting inside a cage. But, he supposed the first thing he’d do when they got back was to enter a cryopod. 

The pain from his legs was almost blinding, sending throbs through his whole body. He was getting lightheaded, and that scared him. It could be an indication that he had lost too much blood already. 

“Lance?”

The voice disrupted his thought, and Lance looked up. “Keith?” The red paladin had opened a private link between them, and he showed up on a screen with furrowed brows. Seeing him again made Lance sag in relief, which confused him immensely. “Keith, you’re alright,” he breathed out. He wasn’t sure if he was just imagining it, but it seemed like Keith’s brows furrowed even more at his words.

“Of course I’m alright. The question is, are you? You said your leg hurts.” There was no way Lance was imagining the worry in Keith’s voice at least.

“Huh? What’s that Kogane?” Lance teased, “Is that worry I hear?” He winked at the red paladin and got a very flustered one in return.

“What!? No! What the hell Lance?!”

For a minute, they were both silent. Lance was still rising towards space, the added weight slowing Blue down a bit. He could see that Keith was in Space on his monitor. Pidge and Shiro was providing backup fire at the ships who were trying to follow them. It was almost an unfair fight, the smaller ships had nothing on the lions. So scratch that, it was an unfair fight. 

Someone mumbled something, and Lance looked at Keith again. The red paladin had his eyes cast down, refusing to meet Lance’s. 

“Did you say something Keith?” Lance asked, confused. Keith’s head snapped back up, and he stared furiously at Lance.

“I said of course I was worried, you stupid idiot!!”

“How dare you call me stupid, you stupid mullethead!” Lance squeaked indignantly. He couldn’t believe Keith! 

Said paladin rolled his eyes, “Of course, that’s what you get from that sentence. You idiot!” 

Lance gasped. “What the!? You dare!? I can’t even with you!!” Lance was starting to relax. The normalcy of this bickering almost brought tears to his eyes. “Stupid mullethead,” he whimpered weakly. And there came the tears. Alarm flashed in Keith’s eyes when Lance began to cry.

“Lance? Lance, what’s wrong!? Does it hurt a lot!?” 

“No, shut up,” Lance huffed, trying to quell the sudden rush of emotions gushing inside him. He glared at Keith, “This is all your fault, you know that right?” 

Frustration clad Keith’s features, “Oh, are we seriously taking this right now!?” If Keith had been a cat, he would have been hissing now. 

“No!” Lance almost shouted between tears. “I’m just- just…” he shivered and looked down. “Just help me get home, please.” 

The plea wasn’t lost on Keith. When Lance locked his tearful gaze on the red paladin again, a soft apprehensive smile greeted him. “Don’t worry Lance,” Keith said. He sounded so kind in that moment, it almost sent Lance into another crying fit. “We’ll get you home right now.” 

 

***

 

Keith’s heart soared when Lance smiled back at him. The blue paladin was pale, but that didn’t matter at the moment. He was safe, and that was the only thing Keith cared about. He saw Lance enter space with Pidge and Shiro on his tail. However, just as he was about to turn Red around, something threw him violently off course with a large explosion. Keith went flying inside Red’s cockpit, crashing into the wall, and he could distantly hear someone calling his name.

“Keith! Oh my god, Keith!” It was a chorus of voices crowding him. He stood up but nearly fell when everything turned around him. Slowly, he made his way back to his chair and slump down in it. 

“What the hell just happened?” he growled at no one in particular. A nervous laugh came from Hunk’s direction.

“Seems like the Galra decided to come. They were waiting for us, I think.” When Keith checked his monitors, he saw several red spots indicating where the Galra ships were. He cursed and quickly evaded another shot aimed at him. 

“Keith!” Lance’s voice rang out at him. Keith looked at the monitors again and saw the blue lion approach fast. He was about to stop the blue paladin, but Shiro beat him to it.

“No, Lance!” Shiro barked. “It’s too dangerous for you right now!”

“What!? But Shiro! I can do it-”

“Lance, return to the castle. You’re putting several lives at risk, including your own. I won’t allow that,” Shiro ordered. “You’re injured, so go back quickly and have Coran or Allura get you a pod.” When Lance still seemed reluctant to do it, Keith intervened.

“Please, Lance. Do it, for my peace of mind at least.” 

Keith saw the shock on Lance’s face when he registered what Keith had said. Before Lance could respond, Keith shut off the link to the injured paladin. He knew that Lance had listened to him when he saw Blue take off towards the castle that was repeatedly firing at the Galra ships. 

“Okay guys,” he addressed the rest of them. “Let’s take these fuckers down.” He growled and pushed down the controllers, storming off for the Galra ships hunting his friends and Lance.

 

The battle didn’t take much longer than a varga, and soon Keith was on his way back to the hangars with Red. As soon as she had landed, he exited the lion and rushed to the medbay where he hoped Lance would be. When he arrived, his heart beat faster than the run normally would have made it. He blamed it on Lance. Because there he was, laying on a stretcher as Coran looked him over.

“Lance,” he breathed out. A pair of blue eyes settled on him.

“Keith.”

It felt so good to hear his voice again so close. Keith couldn’t stop himself as his body moved on its own accord towards Lance. 

“Keith?” 

Two blue eyes peered at him in confusion. They seemed a bit dull compared to the usual luster Keith was so used to. 

“Keith? Are you okay? You hit the wall pretty hard…”

Keith stopped any more words from leaving the blue paladin when he pressed his lips onto Lance’s. A soft gasp escaped from from the hot mouth Keith was suddenly exploring. Then a pair of hands gripped his arms tightly and pulled him closer, almost frantically. He moaned Lance’s name when he heard someone clearing their throat.

At once, he realized what he was doing and drew back while panting. He had kissed Lance. Without having asked permission. Of course, Lance seemed to have appreciated it, judging by the dazed look and slight flush on his cheeks.

“Hrrm, while I do support the two of you, I find it best to let Lance rest up in a healing pod before you venture further in getting to know each other’s… mouths.” Coran kept a straight face as he said it, twirling his moustache. The heat spread quickly to Keith’s cheeks, and he was about to say something when Lance spoke.

“Geez, Coran, don’t interrupt when I’m about to get laid,” the blue paladin whined shamelessly, still looking rather dazed. 

“No can do, my boy. You have injuries in both your legs, I need them to heal before you bleed out on us.” This time, amusement glittered in Coran’s eyes.

“No need to worry about me bleeding out from my legs,” Lance said and winked at Keith. “All the blood in my body has gone somewhere else.” 

Keith was going to die, he knew it. He could feel his face perish in flames, and Lance was doing nothing to douse the fire he had lit. Then his thoughts cleared a little, and Keith grabbed Lance’s arms roughly.

“You’re injured!?” he shouted, and quickly checked Lance over. And sure enough, both legs had blood seeping through the cloth of his undersuit. Panicked, he turned to Coran who was fiddling with a pod. “Coran! Hurry! He needs a pod!”

“Don’t worry, Lance is a fighter. A couple of vargas in here and he’ll be in tiptop shape!” Coran chiped. The door swooshed open and three other paladins staggered in. They all clambered over the floor in a hurry when they saw Lance waving at them cheekily. 

“Lance!” they exclaimed in unison before they rushed him, covering him with their bodies. Keith took a step back and watched it happen, a small smile playing on his lips. 

“You’re okay,” Hunk sobbed, already a complete emotional wreck. 

“Well, not the words I would choose myself, but all in due time,” Coran interrupted and pushed the humans away. “He needs to go in a healing pod, or the two holes in his legs won’t heal!”

Hunk paled quickly when he heard about his friends predicament. “Oh my god Lance! You’re injured!”

“Don’t worry big guy, it’s not that bad,” Lance waved his concern off. Keith just wished he could believe it. But at the moment, Lance looked like crap. A beautiful kind of crap. What the hell? Keith shook his head as Coran helped Lance into a podsuit. 

“There you go! Shiro, might I ask for some assistance to the pod?” Coran demanded rather than asked. Shiro nodded immediately and took hold of one of Lance’s arms.

“Of course, whatever you need. Is this okay?” The black paladin directed the question at Lance who had winced. 

“Yeah, sure. Just feeling a bit peachy,” Lance laughed weakly. “Hurts a bit to walk,” he teased as they made their way to the pod. Another held an alien Keith presumed was one of the ones Lance had saved. He frowned as the pod closed on Lance. 

“Hey, Coran? What’s wrong with this one?” he wondered and pointed at the alien. Coran turned away from Lance’s pod and followed Keith’s finger.

“Ah, it appeared this one had a slight concussion. Nothing serious. They’ll probably be out in a couple of doboshes!” Coran ranted on and checked the readings beside the pod. “Seems like it was really crowded inside the blue lion, and this one lost their balance and fell.” 

“Okay,” Keith shrugged. He hadn’t been that interested. “Why were they put in a pod before Lance then? If it wasn’t that serious?” That was the real question. Lance was more important than them. And especially so since his injuries had been worse. 

“Well, Lance insisted on it of course,” Coran declared. “But honestly, would you expect anything else from our blue paladin?” The old Altean’s voice turned soft, and Keith felt his shoulders sag a little.

“I suppose not,” he murmured, sporting a smile knowing fully well that he truly wouldn’t. It was Lance after all, always putting others before himself. The smile on his face froze when he saw Pidge smirking at him. “What,” he asked irritatedly, feeling the worry in his gut turn. That smirk never meant anything good. 

“Nothing,” the girl singsang. 

“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” Keith spat at her. Her playful smile only grew wider. 

“Well, you just smiled while thinking about Lance. And I couldn’t help but think, is Keith starting to think more of Lance?” the mocking tone made Keith’s defenses rise. “Maybe he likes him?” 

“Am not!” he shouted, feeling his cheeks heat up again. Why was he doing this? 

“Seriously Keith?” Shiro stepped in, an amused look on his face. 

“What?” Keith’s voice was more of a growl now. He couldn’t really understand why he was still pretending to dislike Lance. Had he even done that at any point!? Was it possible for anyone to actively dislike the blue paladin?! 

“Are you trying to argue with Pidge that you’re not fond of Lance, after we spent a minute or so outside the medbay watching through Pidge’s security camera,” Shiro pointed to the corner of the ceiling. “- as you practically sucked Lance’s soul out of him?” 

The heat in Keith’s cheeks was practically hurting him, as he realised everything was out in the open. He glared at the recording device he _should_ have known was there. “Shut up,” he growled, mostly embarrassed and not really angry at all, despite the look on his face he knew was there. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and looked up to meet grey soft eyes.

“It’s okay, Keith. None of us are judging. Rather, we’d like to support you,” Shiro explained with a smile. 

“Yeah, we do,” Hunk concurred. The yellow paladin had a stupid goofy smile on his face. “Ah,” Hunk paused for a second, “but if you hurt him, I’ll hurt you!” 

Keith wasn’t sure what was scarier; the fact that Hunk had uttered those words, or the fact that he had kept the goofy smile on while saying it. When he glanced at Shiro, he saw that the black paladin looked taken aback as well.

“Hunk?” Shiro made it clear he wanted to know what that was. “Why are you threatening Keith?”

Hunk grinned a little, but he also scratched the back of his head as if he was a little embarrassed. “Oh, well… Someone’s gotta give him the shovel talk right? And since Lance’s family isn’t here, that’s up to me and Pidge.” He high fived the green paladin who walked up to his side. 

“Don’t worry Keith, Shiro is planning on doing the same to Lance,” Pidge shot a smile at him that spoke of even more trouble than before. Keith heard Shiro choke on his own saliva beside him. 

“Ah, well. I suppose,” Shiro admitted when he met Keith’s inquisitive eyes. “You’re like my younger brother, of course I have to!” he defended himself. 

“If you do, I’ll disown you,” Keith muttered, loud enough for everyone to hear. 

“Aww, Keith. You can’t take that away from him! This is like Shiro’s dream,” Pidge mocked the black paladin. 

“Aah, young love. I remember when I was your age! My first sweetheart’s father was the owner of the city’s huila shop. When we first met, he decided to test me of whether I was worthy of his daughter or not! I can’t remember a time when I-” 

“Coran! Now is not the time for that story!” Allura’s voice rang out. “And Keith, I am so happy for you and Lance! Love is something to be treasured, especially in times like this!”

Keith had been surprised when Coran spoke up, he’d forgotten that the altean had been in the room with them. And he hadn’t even heard Allura enter the medbay. But he was pleased, until he realised what she’d said.

“Hey, who said that I love Lance!?” he spluttered, face beet red. “I- I just like him…” he continued when he saw the other paladin’s eyebrows rise. “And anyway, there’s no one who knows if Lance feels the same,” Keith said dejectedly. He hadn’t thought about that before he mentioned it. 

“Hah!” Pidge snorted. “That boy has had a crush on you since forever! Not sure if he realised it before today, though.” Pidge snickered when Keith looked at her with confusion evident on his face. “Oh, come on, Keith. You can’t tell me you don’t see it now that I’ve pointed it out for you!?” 

“Ehm, I’m afraid I don’t see it either, Pidge,” Shiro cut in, much to Keith’s relief. He didn’t like feeling stupid, but he did when Pidge acted like Lance liking him had been obvious. 

“Okay, so if I put it like this. Lance is a peacock, you can all see that, right?” she began to explain. Keith nodded along with Shiro, they could both understand the simile. “Yes,” Pidge continued, “so when peacocks try to get the attention of potential partners, they spread their feathers to show off what they got.”

Both Keith and Shiro hummed in agreement. Even Hunk seemed interested in where this was going, and was nodding along.

“Yeah, so… Lance does that all the time. It’s a bit hard not to notice. But for some reason,” Pidge eyed Keith, and he could feel his shackled rising, “for some reason, Keith didn’t notice it at all. So Lance upped his game, trying to best Keith and show him he’d be a good partner that could be his equal.”

Keith was starting to feel lightheaded from the blood rushing to his head all the time. 

“I mean, you don’t just jump in front of an unknown weapon for nothing? Not even Lance is that stupid. He was trying to prove himself to you, Keith. It didn’t make it better that you were riling him up I suppose, nor that none of us stopped you. But that’s the gist of it. I’m 99.9% sure he likes you a lot.” The green paladin’s eyes were clear, and met Keith’s headon when she finished. “So don’t mess this up when he comes out. Or we will hurt you.” Hunk nodded again, to affirm her words. 

“We will.”

“Is this common amongst humans?” Allura asked in curiosity. “Threats, I mean.” She had tilted her head during the conversation. “I know this occured to Coran. However, he’s a bit of a special case, as you might have noticed.” Everyone pointedly ignored Coran’s displeased squeak of protest. Shiro smiled eventually towards the princess.

“Yeah, it’s pretty normal. Not everyone does the shovel talk, but some. It’s mostly done to terrorize the person in question for fun.”

“How barbaric,” they all heard her mutter in response. Then she clapped her hands together, “Maybe we should all get some food?” she suggested. “Lance’s healing won’t be done quicker just because we stand here and watch him.”

“Food!” Hunk exclaimed with his eyes wide open, like he had forgotten that food was a thing. “That’s a great idea!”

Keith shook his head when the others started heading out of the medbay. “I’m just gonna stay here for a bit, if that’s okay?” he said and glanced at the pod Lance was currently residing in. 

“Of course,” Allura replied softly. “But don’t stay here for too long, get a shower and some food before Lance comes out. It’s gonna be awhile, and we don’t need two paladins out of commission.” 

Keith only hummed to show that he heard her, his gaze was locked on the freckled skin behind the glass. He’d probably do as Allura asked, if only to get more comfortable. But not for another while. He wanted to keep looking, to make sure Lance was still okay.

 

When Lance finally got out of the pod, Keith had showered and gotten food in his stomach. After all, it was in the middle of the night. Shiro had suggested some sleep as well, and while the other paladins had thought that was a great idea, Keith knew he wouldn’t find enough peace to manage it. Thus, he sat down on the floor in front of Lance in the darkness. 

The other patient had been released from his pod a couple of hours earlier. Hunk and Pidge had escorted the former slaves to nearby planets unoccupied by Galra in their lions. So, the castle was back to only hosting two Alteans, five humans and four mice. 

Keith rose to his feet when Lance’s pod opened with a hiss. He caught him when Lance stumbled out and kept him upright. Groggily, Lance rubbed his eyes.

“Keith? What are you doing here, where is everyone else?” 

That was the moment Keith remembered the other time Lance had been in a pod. When he had forgotten their bonding moment. What if Lance had forgotten about what happened before he went into the pod this time as well? Keith’s heart was beating quickly inside his ribcage. 

“You were injured, and I was worried,” he admitted slowly. Lance looked confused.

“Why would you be-” he stopped himself, and Keith observed as a pretty blush spread on the blue paladin’s cheeks. “Oh, right. _That_ happened.”

That made Keith nervous. “Do you regret it?” he asked as Lance let go of him, trying to stand on his own. He hoped Lance didn’t regret it, because Keith didn’t. Or maybe a little, because now he could actually be rejected. He felt his stomach churn at the prospect. 

“Just to make this clear, you don’t regret it, right?” Lance cleared his throat and looked down on his feet. Keith blinked once, then twice. 

“Definitely not.” 

Lance’s head shot up with a look of relief, “Oh! Oh, good! Because, you know, I don’t either.” He fumbled with his words. “Regret it, I mean,” he clarified as he twirled his thumbs around. “Ehm, I think- I think I like you?”

The blue paladin sounded so unsure of himself that Keith couldn’t help but laugh. A look of hurt passed on Lance’s face, and Keith realised that Lance thought he had been joking. Keith held up his hands in front of him like Lance was a dangerous animal.

“Ah, no! I wasn’t laughing at you! Or well, I suppose I was. It’s just that-” Keith had to catch his breath. “I like you too,” he finished lamely while looking down on the floor. Two hands grabbed his arms, and when he looked up, crystal blue eyes shone at him. 

“You serious?” 

“Huh? Yeah, I am. I wouldn’t joke about something like that Lance.” 

Keith felt himself being pulled in close for a tight embrace. 

“Good, because I really like you too,” Lance whispered and hid his face in Keith’s neck. They both froze in that position when the door swished open, and the light was turned on. 

“You guys!” In came a sobbing Hunk. “That was-hicc- so beau-hicc-tiful!!” 

“God, Hunk. Couldn’t you have waited a little longer?” an amused looking Pidge said from the door opening. When Keith and Lance looked over, they saw Shiro, Allura and Coran standing there as well. 

“What the hell? It’s in the middle of the night! You guys were asleep!” Keith sputtered. Pidge waved a tablet in front of him.

“I got a notification when Lance got out.” She smirked, “So I checked the monitors, saw you guys, then went to wake up the rest of the team.”

“You little gremlin,” Lance cursed. But Keith could see that he was amused as well. Good to know that he wasn’t embarrassed over whatever was between them now. “Couldn’t you have let me be alone with my boyfriend a little longer?” Lance continued, now facing Hunk.

Keith almost stumbled, even though he stood still. He looked to Lance, wide eyed. “Boyfriend?” he asked breathlessly. He liked the sound of that, it sounded… _committed_. 

“Yeah?” Lance looked unsure again, “I mean, if you’re okay with that.” The blue paladin blushed, “I mean, it’s okay if you don’t want to, but-”

“I’d really really like that,” Keith interrupted him. He could feel everyone’s eyes on him, and it was so embarrassing. However, also so very worth it when Lance’s face lit up as if it was his birthday. He threw himself at Keith and hugged him fiercely. 

“Me too!” he squealed. In the background Hunk made a similar sound, and Keith could hear Pidge making barfing sounds. 

“Congratulations!” Allura hollered with a smile. She seemed to be as excited as Lance was. Lance loosened his grip on Keith before pressing a light kiss on his cheek. The blood flared back, and Keith feared that he might faint. 

Shiro cleared his throat in that moment. “Hrrm, as happy as I am for you too, maybe we should all head back to bed? It’s been a long day, and some of us haven’t slept at all.” He looked sternly at Keith.

“Yeah,” Lance yawned loudly and agreed. “I’m feeling really tired right now,” he admitted. He took Keith’s hand, an action that startled him. “Can I sleep in your room?” he asked, eyes sparkling. Keith thought he’d die right there. Fortunately, he didn’t have to answer himself.

“Maybe we should all go to sleep in our own beds tonight,” Shiro ordered. “Get some real rest. There is a new day tomorrow, don’t forget that.” 

“Okay, dad,” Lance stuck his tongue out at Shiro. Then he tugged at Keith’s hand, “walk with me?” he requested with a soft smile. Keith knew he was damned, because there was no way he’d ever be able to resist anything Lance said if he looked like that while doing it. 

“Yeah,” he agreed quickly, ignoring Pidge’s laugh. They exited the medbay ahead of the others and soon reached their rooms. Keith was tempted to not follow Shiro’s orders, but he could see that Lance was exhausted. “See you tomorrow?” he said and let go of Lance’s hand. 

Lance nodded, “mmm.” He looked around to see if the others had caught up to them, then quickly leaned in and kissed Keith on the lips. “Good night!” he announced loudly with red cheeks. Before Keith was able to say anything, Lance had stepped into his bedroom and closed the door. Keith quickly did the same, but sank down against his door, heart hammering.

“God damn it!” Lance was so cute. He’d lead Keith to an early death if his heart kept on like that. “This is all your fault,” he muttered as he thought of Lance. But he was strangely okay with that. “Dang, I really like that idiot!”


End file.
